[39] Demetrius accuses Timæus of falsehood, for saying that Periander built a wall round the Achilleium out of the stones brought from Ilium as a protection against the attacks of the Athenians, and with a view to assist Pittacus; whereas this place was fortified by the Mitylenæans against Sigeium, but not with stones from Ilium, nor by Periander. For how should they choose an enemy in arms to be arbitrator? The Achilleium is a place which contains the monument of Achilles, and is a small settlement. It was destroyed, as also Sigeium, by the Ilienses on account of the refractory disposition of its inhabitants. For all the sea-coast as far as Dardanus was afterwards, and is at present, subject to them. Anciently the greatest part of these places were subject to the Æolians, and hence Ephorus does not hesitate to call all the country from Abydos to Cume by the name of Æolis. But Thucydides1 says that the Mitylenæans were deprived of the Troad in the Peloponnesian war by the Athenians under the command of Paches.
1 Thucyd., b. iii. c. 50, does not use the word Troad, but says ‘all the towns possessed by the Mitylenæans.’
The Geography of Strabo. Literally translated, with notes, in three volumes. London. George Bell & Sons. 1903.
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